<!-- Idaho boy recovers from final surgery in disorder -->

JEROME, Idaho ---- Nikki Peterson is happy that the last big
surgery is over and her son's life should be extended.

Cayden Peterson can breathe at night now. Before a June surgery
broke all of the bones in his face, his breathing was labored and
often stopped when he slept. She is grateful that the operation her
family has been preparing for all seven years of Cayden's life was
successful.

But she starts to tear up when she talks about his face.

It's different now the facial expressions shes's memorized have
changed. The small nose that she kissed every day is different.
She's watched her baby boy grow into a 7-year-old and now she is
watching him with new eyes, looking for familiar expressions and
his old smile.

"My mom said it best somebody doesn't have to die (for you) to
grieve," Nikki said, wiping tears from her eyes. "I've been
grieving for his face. You don't have the same face for 7 1/2 years
and then change it. I can't read his facial expressions
anymore."

Cayden has Apert syndrome, a rare genetic disorder that affects
1 in 200,000 newborns. The disorder causes the skull and facial
bones to fuse together prematurely, creating a rigid cage around a
child's growing brain.

When he was 5 months old, Cayden underwent his first operation
to break his skull so the bones could grow at the same rate as his
brain. The string of surgeries has continued, 14 in total, from
cutting apart the skin between his fingers and toes so they could
function individually to the last operation to expand his airways
from the size of a dime to around the size of a quarter.

The operations included a string of six surgeries in seven
months of Cayden's early years ---- something his mother said was
like taking large steps forward, only to go back to where they had
started in his developmental process.

Cayden's father, Ryan, 30, and Nikki, 29, were both raised in
Jerome and have been married for eight years. Cayden, their first
child, was also the first baby born in Idaho with Apert syndrome.
The Petersons didn't know where to turn for help.

It's been a long journey for Cayden's parents and 5-year-old
sister, Brynlee. But as Nikki repeats often of helping Cayden
through the string of painful surgeries that are ultimately
expected to prolong his life expectancy to that of the average
American, "We just do it. You don't get a chance to think about
it."

Since June, while other children lived the rough-and-tumble life
of long summer days and baseball in the park, Cayden recovered from
his 13th surgery, performed by Dr. Rodney Schmelzer at Cardon
Children's Medical Center in Mesa, Ariz. The 4 1/2-hour surgery
consisted of breaking all the bones in his face and then
reconstructing them ---- a rare and dangerous operation that
Schmelzer has performed 15 to 20 times in his career. He spent
months rehearsing for the surgery and practiced the night before on
a model of Cayden's skull.